CAN YOU SWING IT? Images of Swing Dance from Across the Nation CHOREOGRAPHER MARK GODDEN EMERGING WITH & COMPOSER RESILIENCE CHRISTOS HATZIS Eking Out a Life In Conversation in Dance about Going Home Star – Truth and Reconciliation GRANT STRATE commissioned by Canada’s Dance’s Spirited Statesman Royal Winnipeg Ballet ACADEMIA EMBODIED PLUS: A Conference Report Guest Contributor from the Canadian Society and Toronto’s for Dance Studies Poet Laureate George Elliott Clarke on Thinking as Dancing Volume 17, Issue 5 September/October 2014 Display until November 5, 2014 / $7.25 online thedancecurrent.com Did you know that our online content is updated regularly? Stay in the loop by checking out our site for the latest dance news, performance listings, videos, reviews and original features and columns. COLUMNS 360 Dance by Philip Szporer, Online Regional Editor (Montréal) TDC on the Ground Lorraine Aston on Dance Therapy at Les Grands Ballets Canadiens Naushad Ali Husein Reports on the Zouk Exchange in departments Toronto Volume 17, Issue 5 / September/October 2014 REVIEWS Dancing on the Edge 6 13 From Our Reviewed by Eury Chang FRONT OF HOUSE What’s In Archives Vibrant Generations Your Dancebag? october 2007: Toronto’s Summerworks By Kate Morris molly johnson mobile clubbing Reviewed by Kathleen Smith revisited 8 14 VENUE Healthy Dancer 18 PERFORMANCE Your Letters the neurology of dance Short Waves & EVENT LISTINGS by Dr. Blessyl Buan dancemakers makes want to increase your WARM-UP changes, the canadian exposure and build 10 healthy recipe senior artists’ resource audiences? submit your Emerging Views & nutrition tip network mentorship performance and event bridget lappin Avocado Oil program, alberta ballet listings through our by Megan Kimmerer by Sarah Maughan ii: new education and website. all listings are outreach program searchable by artist, city, 11 the goods genre and more... Making Waves Ra Energy STUDIO TO STAGE fiona malena 58 by Marie France Forcier 16 Performance CONTESTS Confluences & Event Listings scan for a chance to win! Inspired! burlesque: canadian september & october paul caskey theatre review highlights by Jane Doucet by Sabrina Bellissimo 60 12 17 Advertiser Index Studio Now Check It Out pushpull dance story/time: 62 by Molly Johnson the life of an idea Body Language by bill t. jones the leaps of thought Kelly Slate, Ian Collins, Karen Chang, Elizabeth Bowker, Daniel Grant and Matthew Lee of PushPULL Dance George Elliott Clarke / Photo by Raph Nogal Photography the dance current SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014 5 Volume 17, Issue 5 21 48 September/October 2014 Grant Strate Academia Embodied dance’s spirited statesman a report from csds Feisty, avid and daring, Grant Strate’s Kallee Lins reports from the biennial professional dance career began in 1951 Canadian Society for Dance Studies at the National Ballet of Canada and he conference in Vancouver. Writing about has been a positive juggernaut in the a range of presentations, Lins describes field ever since. One of the country’s how “Embodied Artful Practice” foremost dance educators, Strate also considered the intersection of body developed some of the most important and lasting institutions for choreography in Canada. Strate’s former student and colleague Carol Anderson writes about the man and his legacy. and cognition, as well as movement- based approaches to language, gesture, constraint, improvisation 26 and phenomenology. Can You Swing It? images of swing from across the nation 50 Since the mid-1980s, swing dance Choreographer has witnessed an important revival, Mark Godden & becoming a popular social dance Composer Christos Hatzis features for amateurs from coast to coast. In in conversation this photo essay we pay tribute to Working together on a new ballet the history as well as the many and commissioned by Canada’s Royal varied perspectives on swing from Winnipeg Ballet as part of the company’s contemporary companies and groups seventy-fifth anniversary season, Godden across the nation. and Hatzis talk about Going Home Star Compiled by Brittany Duggan – Truth and Reconciliation. Based on the novels of Joseph Boyden, who writes on historical and contemporary issues faced by Aboriginal Peoples, the work poses special challenges for interdisciplinary collaboration. Transcribed by Kate Stashko On the cover: Mako Ruan and Léo Newman, Vancouver Swing Society / Photo by Rosea Lake; Society Rosea Lake; by Swing / Photo Vancouver Newman, Ruan and Léo Mako On the cover: Amalia Smith and Hiroki Ichinose at Springboard Danse Montréal 2014 / Photo by Michael by Slobodian 2014 / Photo Montréal Danse Springboard Ichinose at Smith and Hiroki Amalia 38 Emerging with Resilience eking out a life in dance Emerging dancers, like their peers in other arts sectors, require determination, ingenuity and discipline. Graduates today seem better equipped to deal with the realities of a career in dance, but they require a strong professional network and community in order to persist. Easing the transition has become a goal for a number of service organizations, while grassroots initiatives and collectives provide spaces of creation and exploration, as well as mentorship opportunities, that keep them dancing. by Kate Morris the dance current SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014 3 warm up Fiona Malena / Photo by Fotostudio Weitwinkel the dance current SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2014 9 WARM-UP Emerging Views Making Waves Bridget Lappin Fiona Malena by Megan Kimmerer by Marie France Forcier Halifax-born iona Malena is Bridget Lappin quite possibly moved to London, the archetype England, in Fof a millennium 2009 to study dancer: self-employed at the London and internationally Contemporary recognized, Dance School multidisciplinary, (LCDS). After culturally selective and graduating with curious. A generation the Principal’s Award for Excellence, Lappin returned to LCDS ago she would have been considered an anomaly, yet for the postgraduate diploma and apprenticeship program, she is now a well-established figure within a growing working with Switzerland’s Bern Ballet. Now living in England community. “In today’s society, we are so global that I permanently, Lappin will return to LCDS in September to pursue think we choose our own culture and how we express it, her master’s degree. rather than being simply born and brought up into it,” says the Calgary-born, trilingual woman who selected flamenco, the Andalusian folk dance form, as her What drew you to the London Contemporary Dance School? artistic medium at the age of eighteen. When it came time for me to consider where I wanted to study, If the local and international climates have been there was a part of me that wanted to do something completely conducive to her success of late, it has not always been different. I had met someone from the UK at the Limón the case. “When I first started, there were no mentors Intensive in the States who suggested that I check out dance for me,” she says. “I had to create this path on my own, schools in the UK. I applied for LCDS and went to their overseas and I made a lot of mistakes along the way.” audition in North Carolina. After speaking with the teachers Nowadays, flamenco is gaining momentum, drawing and hearing a little bit about life at LCDS and in London, I knew on an increasingly solid infrastructure in Canada. that this was the place I had to go. It seemed like this school had Malena recognizes Toronto’s Esmeralda Enrique as everything that I was searching for, along with an energy I really an artist who has helped pave the way, enabling our connected with. national flamenco artists to blossom. Malena’s hard work and passion have paid off. What kind of opportunities were you presented with abroad Recently, she has been working in London where she that you may not have had in Canada? maintains professional relationships with film director Studying in London presented a lot of great opportunities. Saulo Jamariqueli and the multinational cosmetics Exceptionally talented artists were always coming and going firm Molton Brown. With a glint in her eye, she through the [LCDS] building. To have been so directly exposed reveals that she enjoys the life of an internationally to that at such a crucial point in my development as an artist sought-after soloist and takes pleasure in integrating was so great. During my training, I had opportunities to the multifaceted realities of flamenco into a cohesive travel to both Brussels and Vienna for classes. Beyond these practice. “One cannot predict anything because life is so opportunities, I think the most important thing studying abroad changeable and transitory,” she contends, “but so far, I gave me was an immersion in a different dance culture. The way really enjoy what the form has brought me.” [my classmates] moved and created was unlike anything I had La Cueva, a project she is particularly fond of, ever seen. has recently undergone a developmental phase in Cappadocia, Turkey, where she and a small film What is one piece of advice you would give to a young crew slept and worked in a cave for a week amidst dancer wanting to travel abroad and experience different 1,500-year-old stone pillars. “It was a really elemental dance programs? and spontaneous experience,” she says, “I very much felt If you have the desire to study abroad, find a way to make it like I was in the place where I was meant to be.” possible and do it. You have to keep searching until you find your Aside from hopping from place to place on tour niche and I think the best way to do that is to expose yourself to and travelling for creative residencies, she spends something radically different than what you’re used to. a significant portion of her time based in Spain, where she originally trained with acclaimed teachers Learn More >> lcds.ac.uk/usa-canadian-auditions Farruquito, Concha Vargas and Isabel Bayón.